


Gisborne and the Rogue: A Forgotten Robin Hood Tale

by skysonfire



Category: Robin Hood (BBC 2006)
Genre: BBC's Robin Hood, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Forgotten Tales, Light Bondage, Sexual Assault, Subtle Celtic Folklore
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-23
Updated: 2015-10-23
Packaged: 2018-04-27 18:02:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5058442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skysonfire/pseuds/skysonfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kyna, a woman from a foreign land, whose background is shaded by Old Norse myth and magic, arrives in Nottingham. Trained in mind by a prophet and healer, and trained in hand by a warrior, she crosses into England’s unknown with the hopes of discovering her destiny and uncovering her true purpose.</p><p>Upon taking up refuge in Nottingham Castle as an apothecary, Kyna watches political tides shift, and Nottinghamshire is descended upon by a new sheriff and deputy, touting propaganda and a new law, which lays to waste Nottinghamshire’s working folk, and enslaves the masses.</p><p>Amongst the tumult of the new sheriff’s arrival, Kyna comes to the aid of an ailing Sir Guy of Gisborne, ill from arduous travel. Although dangerous, Kyna recognizes courage and a censored kindness in Guy, which awakens in her a curiosity and strange craving.</p><p>As she grows closer to Gisborne, Kyna begins to uncover secrets about his past and links to her own background, but when Gisborne chooses to marry Marian, the daughter of the Shire’s former sheriff, Kyna is forced to choose. Will she remain in Nottingham, or voyage to discover the meaning of the seemingly ancient connections between herself and the sheriff’s mysterious deputy?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gisborne and the Rogue: A Forgotten Robin Hood Tale

“Will the arm heal properly?” The girl’s mother wrung her hands nervously. 

Kyna smiled, first at the young patient under her scrupulous care and then at her flustered mother. 

“Yes.” She tightened the brace around the girl’s shoulder. Brushing back her own shiny, dark curls she looked into the girl’s large hazel eyes. 

“I know it hurts now, but in a few weeks, you’ll be running, playing and helping your mother again.” She stood and addressed the girl’s mother. 

“Make sure that she keeps the arm elevated above her heart. The brace should be worn at all times and the bandages should be kept clean.” Kyna handed the mother a white roll of soft cotton. 

“I-I can’t thank you enough, my lady.” She stepped toward Kyna and pressed a few pieces of silver into her hand.  
“This is all I have …” she started. 

Kyna, in turn, pressed the coins back into the woman’s hand. “Then you should keep them. Use them for bread and meat. Your daughter is going to need to recover her strength.” 

Tears welled in the woman’s dull brown eyes and Kyna smiled at her. She turned to her daughter, who was trying to contend with how the brace fought against her clothes. 

“On your way then. Be a good girl and see your mother home.” The girl simply smiled, and the pair left the largely barren house with a click of the door’s latch. 

Kyna began to tidy up her things and pack them away where they had once before been stowed for travel. She looked around the wooden lodge and sighed quietly. Always on the move. She had thought once that Nottingham would be a fair fit — a place she could call home, but the new Sherriff, well, he had changed things all together. Kyna had once practiced healing in Nottingham castle, but the Sherriff mistrusted her and likened her healing arts to witchcraft. She was forced from the castle to a small plot of land in the countryside where it was made clear she was to remain to leave the healing to the city’s new healer – an old, rough man, with the bedside manner of a hangman. 

The only person who had ever remembered her from the castle was Sir Guy of Gisborne. As the Sherriff’s dog, she wasn’t sure why he continued to pay her any mind, but from time to time he came riding, usually at night, to her lodge to bring herbs, ointments, silk and cotton bandages. 

When the visits first began, she felt certain that he was on a mission to gather information about the goings on in her lodge. She had, once or twice before, assisted Robin Hood’s men, and this had aroused suspicion regarding her allegiance to the governing parties in the Shire. These were things that troubled her not, however. She would help whomever she chose and she would raise iron in defense of the lives she helped save — Robin Hood’s men or no. 

These things were not secrets, but even still, she knew that spies abounded. There was no reason for anyone to show her allegiance. After all, she was a stranger to this land. A Celtic traveler, she had come to England armed only with her knowledge of healing and her skill with an axe. She had no family to speak of and no man to advocate for her. She had made her own way, and although Robin Hood’s band was appealing for a multitude of reasons, she had seen how the Lady Marian switched sides to conveniently chatter rumors and secrets to whoever would bring her the greatest benefit. Kyna found it all very mispleasing, of course, as one who wore her beliefs staunchly on her sleeve. 

She appreciated that Sir Guy showed her the odd token of trust. It made her feel as though she still had a small amount of respect from the Shire, but he had stopped visiting her abruptly in the early spring. Kyna found out shortly thereafter that the Lady Marian had agreed to be his wife. Time continued to spin on, and the more she wasted away in her lodge, attending to the infrequent fever or fracture, the more she felt herself wilting — detached from the world that moved around her, without her.  
Choking on her own life, she recalled her childhood in a land so like and yet so unlike this one. She considered herself lucky. He parents had died in a plague and a smith had taken her under his care. He was a stern, but attentive father, and also the grandson of a proud Northman. He taught her everything she knew about weapons and armor, and had presented her a small axe when she was only five years old, as well as a wooden shield, which he explained were items she should treat as extensions of her own being. Fighting, and understanding how to fight were the only things that would allow her to keep the pain of the world at bay, he told her. So every day she practiced with the smith’s apprentices in the yard, honing her skills and learning about how to keep the world’s pain away, through the understanding of pain. 

One winter, her father had fallen ill and Kyna had called on a local healer. She watched intently as the woman ground herbs into paste and simmered them down into liquid that she then fed to her father. Kyna watched her burn plants and apply ointments, and all the while she asked questions about the origins of the items used and the healing remedies that they were to provide. 

After three days, the healer told Kyna that her father was to die. This woman recognized many gods and she said they had presented to her a vision of Kyna sailing away from their land – her father’s furs wrapped about her – a warrior’s grit carved on her face. 

“You will leave this land and sail to England.” The healer told her. 

“But first, I must teach you everything I know. Your weapons alone will not keep you alive and your feminine form and beauty will put you at great risk.” 

Following her father’s passing, Kyna studied with the healer for months, absorbing all she knew about medicine and the higher arts of alchemy. The healer taught her other things, too, things about men and women, and pleasing men and women, things that Kyna found shocking and enticing and curious. 

“The English think that we are brutal people.” The healer spoke to her softly after an intimate lesson about the female form. “But they are more brutal than we could ever be. Sometimes your body will be the only weapon you have; you should not be afraid of it.” She kissed Kyna’s confused and trembling lips and told her that she would be leaving the next day for her new life. 

Kyna had gathered her things and wrapped herself in her father’s furs as the healer had suggested. The two women made their way to the sailing vessel that would bring Kyna to England, and the healer turned to her one last time, studying her with her warm brown eyes and a disturbingly youthful face. 

“Never sell your body, no matter how desperate things become.” She pulled the furs around Kyna’s neck and weaved her long dark curls into a messy braid. 

“Remember the things I taught you – the things your father taught you, and beware kindness.” Her eyes widened as she looked at Kyna, as though the warning had been freshly delivered into her conscious mind.

“I don’t understand,” Kyna stammered. 

“Kindness is dangerous and will force you to forget yourself. There are things in this world more pure than kindness and truth.” She paused and touched Kyna’s face. “I see rain in your eyes, even now.” She smiled softly at her – a look of resignation on her face as though there were only so many fates she could fight against. 

Kyna stared blankly, simply touching the healer’s hands. 

“Farewell.” The healer kissed her gently on the lips, turned and left, her large woolen hood lifted against the wind. She didn’t look back, and it was the last time Kyna ever saw her. She suspected that she never would again. 

The road was hard when she reached England’s shores; the healer hadn’t lied to her. The men and women she met along the way were hardened salts, bawdy drunks, liars and thieves, or entitled aristocrats. The last were the worst of all and a number of “noble” men had offered to buy her along the road. Her axe had gotten quite a workout as she fought not only for her own safety but for the safety of a small traveling group that had banded together at the dock to voyage to Nottingham. 

One night, only two day’s walk from the Shire, the small group was taken by surprise by a troupe of bandits. Most of the woman who were traveling with the group were raped and killed for any valuables that they had clinging to their person. Kyna fought as best she could, but she was overpowered by three large men. They took from her, her weapons and enjoyed the fruits of her flesh, each man in turn. She surrendered to them and endured the pain they wrought, looking each of them in the eyes as they raped her. They, each of them, allowed her the kindness of survival. 

The bandits had left five of a twenty-person group survive, Kyna among them. She helped three of the remaining women to clean themselves up and provided them with wrappings and salves for their wounds. She took care of herself last, making her way to a small stream and washing the blood from the inside of her legs. She knew her throat had been bruised as one of the men had strangled her while he took his pleasure. Her voice was lost, but she knew that her eyes flared with an angry purpose and she led the small band – three broken women and two old men – into Nottinghamshire. 

Exhausted and bruised, the group broke apart blindly when they reached the city gates. Kyna tried to convince the women to stay on with her, but they were too afraid of the authorities. No one had any money or goods to earn a blessing for safe passage. Kyna alone made her way to Nottingham castle where she begged for council with the Sherriff. 

He was the first gentle man that she had known since her father, and he had granted her rest in the castle until she was able to recover her voice. She was provided with a bath and fresh clothes, as well as the chance to make her case for a place within the city walls. 

After speaking candidly with the Sherriff, he had confided in her that she reminded him of his own daughter, Marian, and that he could see that she had valuable skills that would benefit the Shire. Upon hearing her stories about the healing arts and her prowess with an axe, he allowed her to stay within the castle walls as a medic and counselor. It was a true blessing, and the first night she lay in her own bed, surrounded with new candles, tapestries, furnishings and all the finery of Nottingham, she cried into her pillow tears of joy. She had a place, a home. 

Two winters passed before the new sheriff rode into Nottinghamshire. He was commissioned by the king to take the place of the ailing sheriff who had granted Kyna safe haven in the castle. The sheriffs old and new met cordially enough at the castle gates, some words were said by the hold’s Holy Father, and the proverbial torch was passed from one authority to another. The former sheriff was provided with an ample home for himself and his daughter, as well as two housecarls to tend to their needs. It seemed a kind exchange, but something in Kyna’s gut felt ill when she looked upon the face of the new sheriff. It was something about his hard eyes and his cold, crooked grin that made her wary. He must have known that his presence would cause a degree of discomfort because he came armed with his fair share of distractions. Knights and banners and serving ladies and squires. Casks and trunks and silks and finery. Kyna admired the weapons the knights wore. Elegantly smithed blades with pommels crafted from the finest metals. They were the king’s men – there was no doubting. She wondered what weapons such as those would feel like in the hand – cutting through the air like butter instead of hacking away into the wind with her clumsy axe. 

Kyna returned to her work late that afternoon after the changing of the lawmen. She used the dying light that shone in through the dusty windows to crush lavender and Echinacea, which she mixed with olive oil and left to cool in a wooden boxed packed with fresh ice. As she fumbled about in the last few rays of daylight, the large door to the dispensary opened suddenly and Kyna whipped around, knocking a bottle of damiana seeds onto the floor. She met his eyes quickly and they lunged for the seeds simultaneously, as though engaged in a silent, ritualistic dance. His large, rough hands covered hers for an instant and she truly looked at his face for the first time — his soft, curving, narrow lips highlighted by a deep philtrum and accented by short stubble, which moved along his sharp jaw line. His nose was abrupt and angular without being distracting and his pressing eyes danced a watery blue with dark, hidden shadows in the corners, under a pensive, mysterious brow. He wore black leather and wool, accented with mail at the shoulders and clasped at the front with large buckles. His oily hair parted naturally at the left side and fell in wet waves that hit just below his chin and grazed the back of his neck. Before she lost him to the darkness, his mouth curved up to the left, letting way to a smile that she found quite unusual while forcing her pulse to pound. 

“Forgive me, my lady. The daylight is almost done. I should not have barged in, in such a manner.” His baritone voice hummed in her ear with just the slighted hint of harshness, and she scrambled back. They both rose to their feet. Kyna stood silently in the darkness, just watching his silhouette shift before her. 

“I am simply looking for your apothecary. My name is Sir Guy of Gisborne.” 

Kyna cleared her throat nervously and reached behind her for a candle and a starter striker. She hit it twice to entice a spark, and the flame glowed blue for just a second before she lit the wick and rested the thick pillar on the wooden workbench. 

“My lord,” she started, her voice a scraping squeak in her ears. She smoothed her hands on her skirt and started again. 

“My lord. I am the only apothecary here. My name is Kyna.” 

As the wax melted into the candle’s wick and the flame filled the room, she could see that a thin sheen of sweat covered his face and a pale touch draped his cheeks and lips. 

“You’ve been riding a long time to get her, Sir Guy. It will only take me a few moments to gather what I need to tend to the fever you’ve taken. Please,” she gestured across the room to the windows, under which deep benches adorned with supple cushions sat waiting. 

“Have a seat and remove your coat and whatever armor you wear.” Kyna turned and grabbed for her bottles of feverfew, yarrow and rosemary. It would take a few moments to get a fire going and emulsify the herbs into a consumable infusion. She lit a few more pillar candles and cracked a starter striker in the hearth. The dry straw over the oaken logs caught quickly and she saw him move over to the windows. 

He was quite tall — her head would barely brush his shoulder, and his back was broad, his waist narrow. As she worked, she watched him from the corner of her eye. He removed his coat and armor and sat heavily on the bench, his head leaned back against the wooden frame of the window. She could see his throat move in the moonlight that eased its way through the thick glass and she heard him let out an audible sigh. 

His hand had radiated a dangerous heat on her flesh only a few minutes prior, and she knew that the situation had the chance to turn serious quickly. She made her way to a large wooden chest in the corner and removed a sizeable block of ice, which she wrapped in linen and hit with the back of the fire shovel. Kyna brought the ice to Sir Guy and sat on the bench in front of him, placing the misting package over his forehead. He opened his glassy eyes and reached up over her hand, steadying the ice. Her hand remained under his as she watched his lids flutter. Kyna caught his shoulder as he slipped into unconsciousness, her foot hitting the floor to brace herself, crushing a bunch of damiana seeds under her boot.


End file.
